Budget tweaks

I continue to whittle away at the monthly budget.

$27/mo - DH's cell phone, through Verizon, is now paid off.  The only reason I opted for the monthly payments was they were interest free. We are on the lowest cell phone plan with Verizon ($82/mo for 2 phones) and I'm not changing from them to a cheaper provider. We get good service here at our house (and just about anywhere we go) whereas those who come here with other providers often can't get very good service. We are on the midrange internet plan through our telephone company and I can't go any lower because I need this internet speed to be able to work from home (plus I get reimbursed $30 a month from my employer towards it).

$85/mo - cancelled Dish. I also do not think, at least for the time being we will be paying for any tv subscription service. We'll see how it goes. At the most we'd do $45 a month for one.

$6/mo - reduced one dog's dental treats. I decided to go with the smaller size. Honestly, he crunches them up so fast, I really don't think they probably even do any good, LOL. But now I'll get twice as many for same price.

Until we get settled in, I really won't know if my budget estimate on electricity and propane is going to be accurate. I'm hoping I've over estimated, given how much we ended up having to insulate our house. Starting tomorrow the temps are supposed to be in the 70's every day, so I'm hoping the heat won't even need to be coming on much at all during the night or early mornings. While not living in the house yet, we have just had it set at 62, since it got turned on a few weeks ago. We also do not have our heat pump installed yet, so I'm assuming that will make a difference when it does. We can't install it until the stupid concrete pad is poured for it (which isn't scheduled until next week). Our propane use will go down once we are in the house. We won't need to keep the shop heated, like we have been living in it, though we will still be using propane to heat water for our showers, as the water heater for our master bath is propane. The water heater for the rest of the house hot water is electric. I'm anxious to know what exactly our costs will be

Awhile back I did change DH's health insurance from Obamacare to short term plans, saving $470/mo. I also tweaked our auto insurance a bit, saving another $10 a month.

Other than keeping a closer eye on groceries and sales prices, there isn't much room left to cut back on. I think once we get settled, have room to stock up on sales prices and I have more free time to watch for sales, I might be able to save a bit on my budget there.

The only good thing about the delay in this build is that interest rates continue to creep down a bit, which will help that monthly budget line, when we finally get closed on a mortgage. I'm just praying it continues to come down some more in the meantime.

The plumber has recommended flushing our tankless water heaters twice a year. He said just buy the submersible pump and do it ourselves (you run vinegar through it to clean) and that the cost was $50-$100, one time, rather than $200 or more, each water heater, to have a professional do it. DH looked it up online and they sell kits, but the are $135-$150. DH said well, I have the hoses and bucket, really just need the pump. I looked up online and found a pump for $48, so I ordered it. It's been over 6 months since we've been using the tankless water heater in our shop, so it is due for a cleaning. Even if we only cleaned our 2 tankless water heaters once a year, that's a big savings in maintenance costs over time, just buying the pump to do it ourselves. I read the reviews on the pump and it had 4.7 stars out of 5 and many specifically commented that they purchased it for cleaning a tankless water heater. Others use it for cleaning ponds or pools. We just also have to buy several gallons of distilled white vinegar, which is cheap.

DH's sister texted the brothers something about their dad having a $1000 life insurance policy that money is coming from. $1000? LOL. How does one even get a $1000 life insurance policy? We did find out that SIL got about $45,000 as the beneficiary of MIL's policy. Which is great. She deserved getting that extra money. Just don't understand why she has to be such a turd about splitting the rest of the money. She's probably going to get another $50k from the estate being split up 4 ways. And honestly, it's just a miracle there was even any money to inherit! If either of them had had to end up using that money from the sale of house for long term care, it would have been gone fast and there would have been nothing to inherit. We certainly were never expecting there to be any money left to inherit from them.